Joe Hill’s “Horns” headed to the big screen

I am an avid Joe Hill fan, and that has nothing to do with him being the son of Stephen King. Or the fact that he’s pretty awesome on Twitter. I have found his stories unique and scary in a way I haven’t read since I started reading his dad’s books at a relatively young age. Hill’s “Horns” is no exception to my favorite quirky reading list. It was one of those kinda’ out-there stories that still managed to be wholly frightening, funny and entertaining. So it should come as no surprise that Hollywood is grasping on to that story and turning it into a major motion picture.

Horns revolves around a young man, Ig Perrish, who wakes up one morning to find horns sprouting from his forehead. And this new body enhancement has something to do with the unsolved death of his girlfriend.

Hollywood Reporter has gone on record as stating that Piranha director Alexandre Aja will direct the Horns film for Mandalay Pictures. Personally, I think Sam Raimi would have been a great director, but I guess he’s too busy with that Evil Dead remake. Also, I cannot help but envision the main character, Ig, as a sort of young Bruce Campbell, a la Ward Roberts.

Back in March, though, Shia LaBeouf had already signed on to play Ig, but I still think Roberts is the better (albeit lesser well known) choice. A name like LaBeouf gives the film more bang for the buck, obviously, but I’m not sure he has the chops to pull this off. Or maybe I’m still a little bitter about that last Indiana Jones movie that he was in. Or all of the Transformers films (especially 2). Maybe this will be the role where he actually shows us that he can really act, who knows?

There is a lot of potential for a really good flick here. So please, Mandalay Pictures, don’t screw it up. I shall remain hopefully optimistic.